


Goodbye Rhaegar

by SassyEggs



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, F/F, Lyanna POV, No Smut, mature themes
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-14
Updated: 2019-07-14
Packaged: 2020-06-28 08:00:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,197
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19808074
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SassyEggs/pseuds/SassyEggs
Summary: Lyanna Stark meets the family





	Goodbye Rhaegar

“Nervous?”

She _is_ nervous though she tries her hardest to hide it, tries to keep her hands from shaking and quiet the rapid thumping in her heart. But Rhaegar’s smile is warm and encouraging and she knows it will be fine even if meeting the wife is a pretty big and unusual step. 

He’d never hidden the fact that he was married, was absolutely honest and upfront about it which was admirable in some way, she supposes. It certainly is a convenient ‘out’ if ever she wants one. But for now… she doesn't want one. 

And so there they are, on their way to meet the family. She’s starting to think they aren’t ever going to get there when Rhaegar turns his Camaro between two dragon-topped pillars, down a winding driveway up to an enormous flagstone estate that he’d never once mentioned.

The children are adorable and peek from behind their mother’s legs as if meeting a stranger. And Lyanna _is_ a stranger, of course, but she thinks it odd that they treat their own father the same way.

The wife looks tired. She notices that right away and wonders if that’s why they have an open marriage-- so that he can spend time with a woman who isn’t so tired. It makes sense, in a way, though she can’t help but think maybe the wife wouldn’t be so tired if her husband was actually around more.

And once they are done with the preliminary hellos they head out onto the terrace so she can meet his father.

“You have a beautiful family,” she tells him later when he asks her what she thinks. His family _is_ beautiful-- all of them-- but there was something about the way his father ignored the wife that made her uneasy. 

“That’s just how he is,” Rhaegar shrugs when she mentions it. “It doesn’t mean anything.” 

Seems to Lyanna that it must mean _something_ , but it’s been a really long, really strange day and she kinda doesn’t want to think about it anymore.

+++++++++++++++

At first she keeps her distance; they _both_ do. What would they talk about, anyway? The only thing they have in common is the man they both sleep with and Lyanna definitely doesn’t want to talk about _that_. 

By the second week they’ve taken to meeting as a family in the game room-- all of them, together, the children as usual mostly ignoring their father. Which is unfortunate- Rhaegar seems especially proud of his children though it also seems he is merely proud of their existence and not much more. 

Rhaenys likes her, she can tell, and not just because Lyanna calls her ‘princess’ though it’s a title the child more than deserves. Aerys does not like it, says no Targaryen will be squeezed into some boilerplate, mass-produced, Disney-esque bullshit but Lyanna rolls her eyes because that’s not how she means it. 

On her second night there, Rhaenys had produced her obviously-loved game of cyvasse and asked Lyanna if she would play. The girl fought tooth and nail for her right to go first-- because it was _fair_ she had said, firm and kind at once-- and only after she’d successfully won her argument did she declare that Lyanna could go first after all. 

“Your people will love you one day, princess,” Lyanna told her then just as she tells her now, and is surprised to see for the very first time a hint of a smile from the wife.

+++++++++++++++

She wonders if the wife hates her for being there, knows in her heart that she must. She never protests, though, so maybe she actually _is_ as accepting of the situation as Rhaegar insists she is. It’s a strange arrangement, but Lyanna knows stranger things have happened in this world. 

With time they get used to each other, and the new dynamic of their lives, settling into something comfortable with no drama or tension at all. 

Unless the old dragon is around, of course. 

“He’s just having a bad day,” Rhaegar says after Aerys complains that his grandson _smells foreign._ “He’s not always like this.” 

Lyanna doesn’t think he should _ever_ be like this, even on bad days, but good, sweet, sensitive Rhaegar makes it seem almost normal. 

And everyone had bad days once in a while, didn’t they?

+++++++++++++++

Elia says the funniest things sometimes, little jokes uttered quietly as if trying to amuse only herself. She always looks surprised when Lyanna laughs. No one else notices. With time it becomes a thing they share, something even better than that _other_ thing they share. 

It seems more and more often they find themselves alone with the children, just the four of them, a meal or a movie or a game between them. Elia talks about her family some of the time- her brothers, her father, her mother, the home she misses and wants the children to see. Lyanna suggests she take the children for a visit (in a tone that implies it should be _more_ than just a visit), but Elia shakes her head. 

“Oh no, I could never leave. Even if I wanted to.” 

The fact that she _does_ want to is not actually stated but Lyanna can hear it there anyway, and the terms of their little arrangement don’t seem so perfectly clear anymore. She can't leave. Because what would happen if she did? Rhaegar might not care about Elia but he’d made it perfectly clear he was owed those children. He would fight her, and win, because the courts weren’t always fair when money and prestige were involved. Not to mention the rampant rumors about what the Targaryens were capable of when they were crossed. It would be foolish to fight him, and foolish to leave. She would lose her children but worse, her children would lose _her._ Who would protect them from Aerys’s madness, the abuse that seemed to grow worse every day? Certainly not Rhaegar; he’s proven that, repeatedly. 

And so she stays. Lyanna can hardly imagine the strength required to handle such a thing, the quiet dignity of carrying on as if everything were fine. She could never do that, and she knows that makes her the weaker of the two.

+++++++++++++++

She almost died. It hardly seems possible that this adorable little boy could have been such a risk to his mother’s life and yet Lyanna knows that sort of thing still happens, even in this day. What does not usually happen is the request that soon followed, a confession that he wanted more children, and a suggested alternative if Elia didn’t ‘feel up to it.’ Lyanna can’t even imagine what it was like for her- delirious from pain, woozy with medicine, standing on the cusp of death… and saying anything at all to make Rhaegar’s sensitive smile go away. She doesn’t even sound hurt when she talks about it, she only sounds angry. Lyanna doesn’t blame her even a little.

+++++++++++++++

“It’s not right,” she tells him one especially bad night. It’s awful enough the way Aerys rains contempt on his daughter-in-law, but it’s even worse that he does it to the children. Babies, both of them. His own blood. And Rhaegar just stands there as if nothing noteworthy is happening at all. She wonders-- demands to know-- how he can tolerate such a thing from his father. 

“He’s a good man, honest,” Rhaegar insists. His smile is warm and encouraging, and she wants to claw it off his face. She doesn’t even pretend to believe him.

If she had any sense at all she would leave this place, leave this dysfunctional family behind. But she never leaves, and never really wants to. Not alone, at least.

+++++++++++++++

Rhaegar doesn’t seem to be around much anymore. She almost never sees him during the day though he does still visit her at night, crawls under the covers with her and carefully removes her nightgown. 

_Price of admission_ she thinks to herself and tries not to laugh. If only he knew how little she cared for him, how much she hated his touch and only allowed it so she could stay here, in this home, for reasons that have to do with him but not in the way he thinks. If he paid any attention at all he would know, because she tells him her true feelings in every way she can think of-- by never smiling, never laughing, never reaching for him or seeking him out-- but sweet, sensitive, charming Rhaegar doesn’t even notice.

+++++++++++++++

“Shut _up!”_ she snaps after one too many snide comments, anger crackling in her voice. “Nobody was even talking to you.”

She half expects to be consumed by the fire in his eyes but Lyanna refuses to back down. He may be set in his ways but she’s had enough, and if Rhaegar is too lazy to rein in his father then she would do it herself. What does it matter, anyway? She isn’t family, has no ties here, she can leave if she wants to, and if he tries to stop her… oh, she _hopes_ he tries to stop her. 

But the old dragon is not as dumb as she thinks, and instead focuses his fire at his usual target.

Elia doesn’t look at her-- doesn’t even look surprised-- when Aerys makes a not-particularly-veiled threat about killing her while she sleeps. All Lyanna can think is _that is not fucking happening._

“Family heirloom,” she explains later, standing barefoot in Elia’s darkened room, and though she can’t see much she would swear she sees the fear drain away. They sleep soundly that night and every night after-- four in a bed, the door locked and barricaded, and Ice within easy reach.

+++++++++++++++++++

They never see Rhaegar around the house, don’t even know if he knows where she sleeps now, and she wonders if he’s out there trying to find another woman to fall for his lines. She was that woman once; she’s embarrassed now to think of it but thankful for where it lead her. In some small way she supposes she’s grateful to him for that, but not grateful enough to actually want him. His face is handsome and his smile is sensitive but Elia’s hands are softer, her body warmer, her heart… well, nothing can compare to her heart. 

Elia doesn’t look as tired anymore. It doesn’t have anything to do with sleep, Lyanna thinks, but with the relief of having someone by her side, sharing her burden, holding her every night in the way her husband never did. She hates him for that, for never managing to love his wife when Elia is so easy to love. 

++++++++++++++

They’re watching television together-- all of them, at Aerys’s insistence-- Elia and Lyanna and their kids, Rhaegar and Aerys, all in the enormous living room watching a documentary on dragons. Not real ones, of course-- those haven’t been around for centuries-- but the Targaryen’s certainly still have a reputation. It’s exactly the sort of thing that flames Aerys’s madness, the sort of thing that makes Rhaegar puff with pride. 

The program is exactly 60 agonizing minutes on the Targaryen empire, going back hundreds of years and including-- rightly or wrongly-- every misdeed along the way. Even present day politics don’t sound so pleasant under the producer's scrutiny. It’s enough violence and corruption to make anyone pause, and certainly enough for the hired expert on the show.

“The world could certainly stand to lose a few dragons,” he says, his serious face filling the frame. 

Rhaegar laughs loudly at the idiocy. Lyanna and Elia exchange a look.

+++++++++++++++

“Can’t say I’m surprised,” Officer Jaime Lannister says. “Aerys was getting crazier by the day, seemed only a matter of time before he lost it entirely. Pity he had to take his son with him, though. And that you had to see it.”

Lyanna only nods, a solemn and _expected_ gesture but on the inside she’s laughing-- the Lannisters are as crooked as the Targaryens are crazy so it’s a bit of an irony to hear this one show any kind of concern. 

“Do you need a ride somewhere? I can have someone take you.”

“She can stay here,” Elia says softly from the shadows; Officer Lannister’s handsome face screws up into confusion. 

“Here? But your husband…”

“Would want me to stay.”

“And the children…”

“They didn’t see anything,” Lyanna interrupts. “They don’t even know.”

_Nor would they care._

It _is_ a pretty unusual request, to want to stay at the scene of what is already being labeled the most gruesome crime of the decade. But Lyanna and Elia are as united in this as they are in other ways and it doesn’t take much more to convince Officer Lannister to let them stay.

+++++++++++++++

“Nervous?”

She _is_ nervous and sees no point in denying it since Elia can see right through her anyway. But her smile is kind and loving and she knows it will be fine even if meeting the family _is_ a pretty big and important step. And so there they are, hand in hand as they steer past water gardens and trees laden with oranges, up the winding drive to Elia’s home.


End file.
